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The journey of the US Republican Party has evolved significantly since the early 1900s when Teddy Roosevelt took office following the assassination of William McKinley, a figure admired by Donald Trump.
Roosevelt famously challenged the dominance of powerful industrialists who had monopolized American commerce.
During his presidency, he initiated 44 anti-trust actions over eight years, dismantling monopolies in industries like railroads and notably breaking up John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil of New Jersey, which once held a staggering 90% of the oil reserves.
In contrast, Donald Trump’s America, characterized by immense wealth, often sees the influential wielding considerable power. The former president, who believes everything has a price, even expressed interest in purchasing Greenland.
Trump’s limited application of anti-trust legislation, historically used by past leaders to counteract dominance by major corporations such as big oil companies, AT&T, and IBM, has facilitated corporate expansion.
Elon Musk, already the owner of Twitter, now rebranded as X, is not stopping there. His ambitions have grown to include a potential acquisition of Ryanair, Europe’s largest airline, valued at £30 billion.
Snub: The row between Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary (pictured) and Elon Musk flared when the airline said using Musk’s Starlink internet service would come with a bill of $250bn
The Tesla boss posted on X that he wanted to ‘buy Ryan Air’ and restore the company to its rightful owner. Never mind that founder Tony Ryan died two decades ago.
The row between pugnacious Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary and Musk flared when the airline declared that using Musk’s Starlink internet service would come with a bill of $250billion (£185billion).
The notion that everything is for sale encouraged the world’s once-second-richest person, Oracle chief Larry Ellison, to believe that family dominated Paramount Skydance will triumph in the battle to control Warner Bros Discovery. The belief is the President is unlikely to go after the deal on anti-trust grounds.
The entitlement of the rich has seen Musk’s fortune swell by $234billion during Trump’s first year in office. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has become $15billion richer, and so on.
The incestuous AI boom has seen the big players, such as Microsoft, accumulate a 27 per cent stake in OpenAI. There has been barely a squeak from the authorities about the Silicon Valley champions scooping up AI pioneers.
Britain has given ground to big tech and the monopolists by inserting an Amazon chieftain, Doug Gurr, as chairman of the Competition and Markets Authority.
Labour required the admirable chief executive Sarah Cardell, who battled the might of Microsoft, to speed up probes and go easy.
The accumulation of market and political power by the rich, at the expense of consumers, shames capitalism. O’Leary is right to fight back.
Paying the price
Economists predict Britain’s inflation rate, the highest in the G7, will be back at its 2 per cent target in the first half of this year. The Government has made tackling the cost of living its priority.
Despite changes such as the Budget pledge of a £150 cut in household energy bills from April and frozen rail and prescription charges, consumer price inflation was stubbornly high at 3.4 per cent in December.
The jump is blamed on tobacco and air fares, as if they are exceptional items. Yet they impact millions of lives. Core inflation, excluding energy, food, alcohol and tobacco, is stuck at 3.2 per cent.
As worrying is the cost of services, a key measure for Bank of England rate setters, which rose by 4.5 per cent last month, up from 4.4 per cent.
There are other price shocks in the pipeline. Natural gas is up 25 per cent in the last week.
The decision of Chancellor Rachel Reeves to confine relief on business rates to pubs, excluding restaurants and hotels, can only add to bills.
Wage settlements at 4.5 per cent may be trending down but cannot be absorbed fully.
Moreover, as Keir Starmer noted this week, the impact of new tariffs could make goods less affordable. The disease of surging prices is undefeated.
Heritage matters
Changing leadership can work. Much of the speculation about Burberry in recent times has been around who would step in to save Britain’s flagship luxury retailer.
The arrival of Joshua Schulman in 2024 and a return to a core focus on trench coats, scarves and legacy has dramatically altered prospects. Sales to Generation Z consumers in China are soaring.
Across the group store sales were up 2 per cent in the three months to December. A 29 per cent rise in the shares this month should help keep predators at bay.
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